Today I wanted to share another great little board game with you. As you may know, we joined the team of bloggers for Orchard Toys a while ago, which means we get to test games for them every now and then, and the latest one was a big hit with my boys.

The game is called ‘Dinosaur Lotto’ and is aimed at ages 3 to 7, which is perfect for my two boys who are at either end of that age bracket. You can play it with 2 to 4 players, though when Granny was recently visiting, our 3 year old teamed up with Daddy so that all five of us could play.

So what’s in the box? There are 24 cards, and 4 double-sided boards. The boards come in two parts each, which is great because it means when they tidy away they take up less space, and they are also small enough to stick in a zipper pouch instead of the box, e.g. if we want to take the game on holiday with us. The boards have an easy side and a more challenging side, but I will come back to that in a moment.

The game play is really simple. If you have played other lotto style games in the past, you will already be familiar with it. To begin with, every player gets a board, and the cards are spread face down in the middle of the table. When it is your turn, your turn over a card. If the card matches your board, you get to keep the card and place it on your board. If it doesn’t match, you show the card to the other players then return it face down to the table. The winner is the first person to match six cards to their board.

What makes this game different to other lotto games we have played in the past, is its two different levels. Each board consists of a dinosaur scene on the top half, and six squares on the bottom half. On the easy side of the board, those six squares show pictures identical to the ones on the cards, so you just need to check of the card matches the picture squares on your board. On the more challenging side, the squares are blank and instead you need to check if the pictures on the cards appear in the dinosaur scene at the top of your board. It’s a bit more difficult, because they may look a little different – e.g. some dinosaurs are facing the other way in the scenes – and there are extra elements in the scenes such as added trees or other landscape features. So you need to look a bit more closely to see if the cards match your board, which encourages observational skills.

What’s so great about these, is that you can mix it up if you are playing with kids of different ages, so my 3 year old can use the side with the pictures, and my 7 year old can use the blank side. I also love this game because it’s really great for developing memory skills and matching skills, and as we have come to expect from Orchard Toys, the illustrations are really lovely too.

We’ve had this game for a few weeks now, and it’s one that keeps getting picked again and again, so it definitely gets a big thumbs up from both my boys, and a thumbs up from me too!

Dinosaur Lotto is available from the Orchard Toys website, and retails at £7.50

Disclosure: We received a free copy of Dinosaur Lotto from Orchard Toys, in return for an honest review. All images, words and opinions are our own.